#I wasn't sure if I should include Lan Wangji as well or not because he has a bit more single dad energy

[welcometothelairofthebitchking]

It's insane how many single mothers there are in MDZS! Wei Wuxian, Jiang Cheng, Lan Qiran-

*I am taken out by gunshots before I can start a doscussion on whether we can also include Nie Mingjue and Lan Wangji or if they have single dad energy*

[ineedtorantaboutjiangcheng]

Fuck, I'm here again. Goddammit. I've been doing well. I've been keeping Jiang Cheng off my mind (and my computer screen). Things have been peaceful.

And then today happened.

Again, a fic. Again, not naming names, both because that's rude and also because this issue is hardly specific to one fic alone. I've seen it many times.

But I've been pacing for half an hour, too agitated to keep reading, so I'm just gonna get this off my chest, and then skim through the fic 'til it stops talking about it.

I need to talk about the golden core reveal.

Specifically, I need to talk about an attitude I've seen cropping up recently in a lot of fics. (By recently, I don't mean it's only recent fics that do it, just that I've only noticed it recently.)

So it'll be a fic, usually canon divergent, but prior to the golden core reveal. Wen Ning or Wen Qing will often be involved (though I can think of a few times it was Lan Wangji). And the character, who knows the truth about the golden core transfer, will urge Wei Wuxian to tell Jiang Cheng.

They'll say "you have to tell him". They'll say "he'll find out eventually". They'll say "he deserves to know".

And... the fic will support this.

Will frame Wei Wuxian as irrational, paranoid even, to keep it secret.

Will sometimes even punish him, narratively, for his "failure" to disclose such a thing.

And I am... completely baffled.

Where the fuck is this coming from?

I suppose, if I'm being generous, I can kind of see why an individual sympathising with Jiang Cheng might have a knee-jerk reaction to this. If you see them as being essentially family, the idea that a family member that you love deeply, keeping what amounts to both a huge sacrifice and a massive disability from you would be extremely painful. You might feel hurt, that they didn't tell you. Angry, at the implied lack of trust.

I get it, as an emotional response you might have in the moment. I don't find it particularly relatable, but I can follow the thought process.

But like... that's an emotional response. Surely, at some point, logic has to kick in, right?

Because the thing is. Okay, there's two aspects to the secret, right? One, is that a medical procedure was done to Jiang Cheng, sort of like an organ transplant, I suppose, but he wasn't told that the organ was donated by Wei Wuxian. And the other is that Wei Wuxian made this huge sacrifice for Jiang Cheng, and didn't tell him.

But thinking about this for even five minutes should tell you that... neither of those things are actually Wei Wuxian's responsibility to deal with?

The first one is the by far the more common argument I've seen. I've read fics where Wen Ning and Wen Qing are tortured with guilt over having performed the procedure without telling Jiang Cheng all the details. I've even seen people have them blame Wei Wuxian, for demanding they keep it secret, had them secretly resent him for it. He's portrayed as deeply selfish, for keeping the truth of Jiang Cheng's operation from him.

But the thing is... if you're going to apply modern medical ethics to the situation... Wei Wuxian was in the right? They all were?

Under modern medical ethics, you have no right to know the identity of your organ donor. That can feel a little weird (it's probably why people often have a knee-jerk reaction that demands the opposite); after all, it's my body, shouldn't I have a right to know where the organ that goes in it comes from? What if it has cooties?

But according to medical ethics, the donor's right to medical privacy is more protected that the recipient's right to that information. Right to medical privacy is pretty highly valued; it kind of ties into body autonomy, which is kind of the keystone of... most modern ethics. You have a right to control what happens to your body, and that includes controlling whether or not people know about any medical conditions/procedures. So you might have an emotional response, thinking Jiang Cheng is valid for being upset that his golden core came from Wei Wuxian without him knowing, but... ethically, Wei Wuxian has the right to withhold that information.

But! some scarecrow says, If a person has the right to control what procedures happen to their body, surely that means Jiang Cheng has a right to control what happens to his own body! Therefore, the procedure was still unethical, because he didn't know everything!

And I say, well... not really. The reality is, we don't actually know how much Jiang Cheng was told. He was told to walk up a mountain, lie to the person he encountered about his identity, and ask for a golden core. And he left that mountain with said golden core... but we don't know how much Wen Qing told him when he reached the top. We know he believed Wen Qing was the Baoshan Sanren. We know he received a fully developed core, not just the ability to form a new one. Was he told that the core was from someone else? Were there signs of the transfer? Did he know the chance of success/failure? Did he not find any of the situation dubious?

(Did he really spend two and a half years fighting a war alongside, and then running a sect for a year with, someone and not realise they didn't use orthodox cultivation even once?)

The truth is, a doctor is required to inform a patient of risks, and answer any questions they ask. Wen Qing may well have disclosed the risk (if there was any to Jiang Cheng, other than potentially the transfer failing) prior to the surgery, we just don't know. We don't have any evidence that Jiang Cheng asked any questions, and from what we see in the novel, it seems likely that he simply didn't want to know. He got a core, his life was somewhat back on track; we never see any evidence of curiosity or confusion in him as to the specifics of how that happened.

The only lie we are sure that he was told was the identity of the person who he met on the mountain, who "gave" him the core. I could be petty and point out that as he was also lying about his identity, it kind of cancels out, but that would be a bit ridiculous, and unnecessary besides. The truth is, ethically, Wen Qing could have knocked him out and performed the surgery from the comfort of her own office. Because one of, if not the main reason you can ethically violate someone's body autonomy... is to save a life. And Jiang Cheng, after losing first his family and sect, and then his golden core, displayed clear suicidal ideation. He indicated, repeatedly, that he wanted to die. He refused food. Wei Wuxian even doubled checked, before giving him hope of getting a new core, that he was serious! (Rereading that scene is horrible; Wei Wuxian's dread, and eventual resignation/resolve becomes very apparent once you know what's happening).

The characters around him, including a trained doctor, believed that if he didn't get a new core, he would give up and die. Under those circumstances, a doctor has authority to make medical decisions, without a patients consent, if they believe it is a medical emergency. Wen Qing was an unquestionably brilliant doctor; if she believed doing the surgery was the right/necessary decision, who the hell are we to dispute her?

So, to be clear, under modern medical ethics (which seems to be what is being applied in these claims), Wen Qing has the right to do whatever surgery she feels necessary to save the life of her patient, no consent needed, and Wei Wuxian has the right to keep his identity as the donor a secret, since that's his own private medical history. Modern medical ethics (a bit ridiculous, when talking about magic powers, but I've seen the argument) supports our protagonist.

Now, onto the other thing. This is a lot less... ethics discussion and a lot more feels-bad-so-wrong type thing. Wei Wuxian kept the loss of his golden core a secret.

Jiang Cheng being upset by this is understandable. Like I said, I can follow the emotion/logic. Someone keeping a big secret from you can be hurtful.

But just because it's hurtful to you, doesn't mean they're in the wrong to do it!

If someone I cared about kept a massive secret from me, and I found out, I'd be upset! But my first thought would be 'Why did they feel they couldn't tell me?' And the answer here is obvious; Wei Wuxian didn't think he could tell Jiang Cheng because he knew he'd be horrible about it! Wei Wuxian admits, after the reveal, that the process of losing his core was distressing, and that he wasn't as okay with it as he pretended to be. If something like that happens to you (not... that it can, but, you know, equivalent), and you're struggling to hold it together, the last thing you want is someone you care about yelling at you about it, insulting you, making you feel bad for what happened!

Wei Wuxian didn't tell Jiang Cheng because he knew Jiang Cheng would be awful to him because of it. Jiang Cheng's jealousy when they were young was something Wei Wuxian felt he had to manage*, and he knew Jiang Cheng would feel inadequate if he realised his accomplishments were made with Wei Wuxian's core. And he would then lash out at Wei Wuxian for it, at a time when Wei Wuxian was already feeling emotionally fragile. Hell, nearly twenty years later, Jiang Cheng getting up in his face was enough to cause a Qi deviation; I can't imagine it would have been better any sooner!

No one wants to think of the people they love keeping secrets from them. And sometimes, people who keep secrets are doing it for their own sake, because they're scared, or unsure, or guilty, or whatever. But sometimes, when a person keeps a secret, the reason is not internal. If someone acts horribly to you when you tell them things, you're going to stop telling them things. And the person responsible for that gap in communication is them; all you're doing is protecting yourself.

And before anyone thinks that I'm assigning reasoning to Wei Wuxian that he doesn't have; he essentially admits it. After the reveal, Wei Wuxian states that he knew Jiang Cheng would react badly (though he didn't expect it to be quite so bad). Wei Wuxian is shown to have been managing Jiang Cheng's moods since they were young**, it's probably not the first secret he's kept. But that's kind of just... how that works; if a king kills every person who brings him bad news, eventually, all his advisors will only ever bring him good news. And he has no one to blame when his kingdom falls but himself.

SO. tl;dr. Modern medical ethics supports Wen Qing performing the golden core transfer, and Wei Wuxian keeping his identity as the donor a secret. Jiang Cheng can be upset at Wei Wuxian for not telling him that he no longer has a core, but it's not unethical, or selfish, and the nature of their relationship, with Jiang Cheng lashing out with impunity and Wei Wuxian trying to manage his moods, meant that secrets like that were pretty much inevitable. Unhealthy relationships are unhealthy. Truly, newsworthy take.

And one final note, on Wei Wuxian keeping secrets from Jiang Cheng and being portrayed as selfish for doing so; I have yet to see a. single. fic. that says Wei Wuxian keeping his sacrifice secret is wrong, but then goes on hold Jiang Cheng equally accountable for keeping his sacrifice secret. Not. One. Jiang Cheng often tells Wei Wuxian afterwards, that he deliberately got the Wens attention, but he's never framed as selfish for keeping that secret. Not. Once.

* see post-Xuanwu argument, when Wei Wuxian drags himself out of his sick bed, having just woken up from a coma, to reassure Jiang Cheng that he's no threat to his birthright. Because Jiang Cheng was jealous that his father acknowledged Wei Wuxian's skill in surviving, under horrendous circumstances. -_-

** childhood flashback; after arriving in a new place, having a massive change in lifestyle and meeting many new people (and, it seems, trying to make a good impression), Wei Wuxian took the blame for his broken leg, despite it being because Jiang Cheng locked him out of his room and threatened to sic dogs on him. Entirely because he knew one of them would get blamed, and he wanted to keep Jiang Cheng happy. People who grow up with aggressive/abusive family/people around often end up learning to juggle mood changes.

[whetstonefires]

Hmm 18 and 29?

18) What’s one of your favorite lines you’ve written in a fic?

Oh gracious. I honestly like my own stuff quite a lot, as a rule, or I wouldn't work on it long enough to finish anything. Fortunately it says 'one of.' Asking for a very favorite always paralyzes me aslkdjadfs. This is hard.

Is the word 'line' here meant to be 'pieces of dialogue' or 'sentences' or what, do you think?

I decided to pick something from my 'Jason Todd getting parented' era and then couldn't find the time to reread the like 30k of All the Roofs of Uncertainty that involve Bruce to pick out a line, so I'm going to nominate something from the fic where Talon!Jason and the Jokester have a heart-to-heart on a roof.

Hm. It has fewer good bits than roofs, being shorter, but they're all kind of interdependent, they don't stand alone very well. Hm.

"And remember, no matter what, you still have us." Jason wasn't sure what he gave away, but there must have been some kind of surprise, or doubt, because J pulled his hand away and frowned. "What, you thought…? You're one of us. Even if you leave. We love you, JJ. That's not gonna just stop." Jason opened his mouth to say something scathing, or dismissive, or defensive, but (maybe because he hadn't quite decided what tack to take) what came out was, "Why?" To be honest, it sounded more like 'whhyyyyyy?' Half whine, half word, a long syllable dragging itself out of his throat as he tried to take it back. Jokester stared at him for a split second, his hand moving like he wanted to reach out and grab Jason again but decided not to, twitched a little like he couldn't find any words that would fit out his mouth, and said, "Because!" Jason was pretty sure he said something like "that's a stupid reason why are you so stupid all the time," but honestly he wasn't sure because his body had gone into full scale mutiny and decided that it wanted to cry.

(It's the 'that's a stupid reason why are you so stupid' bit I'm so fond of; Jokester got a lot of the series' themes put into his dialogue here and they did a lot of emotional lifting, so including that bit that made me laugh felt like it made the whole fic work better.)

29) Share a bit from a fic you’ll never post OR from a scene that was cut from an already posted fic.

Oh this is fun, I have so many abandoned fics.

Ah! Here! A bit I had a lot of fun writing from near the end of a fic I abandoned at 65k because both the characterization and narrative had too many structural flaws to be worth the effort of an overhaul.

“Uh, Lan Zhan? What is this?” Lan Wangji glanced away from the growing stack of rice long enough to see Wei Ying’s baffled, nervous smile, then went back to counting and stacking. “Inadequate,” he said, and kept drawing out baskets from his qiankun bag. “Uh,” said Wei Ying, which was amusing, but not enough for Lan Wangji to let himself lose focus and lose count. Wei Ying sidled over and pried up the lid of a basket; stared at the contents. Uttered a stifled oath, stepping back and taking in the growing wall of rice. Mentally, Lan Wangji calculated. One dou of rice could make a single, small meal for the whole Burial Mounds population; to feed them all well, say four dou a day. Lan Wangji had appropriated well over a thousand dou of rice from the Lan—perhaps two weeks’ food, there. Here, a thousand dou would last nearly a year if they relied on it entirely and did not stint, which seemed unlikely—but it would not keep so long, in these conditions, probably even in a qiankun pouch, so some of it would have to be sold, so it would not go to mold and waste. A year of life. That was all he could offer. Such a paltry recompense, but at least it answered a real need, rather than offering merely what he thought should be wanted. Lan Wangji could learn. “Lan Zhan,” Wei Ying said more sharply, when he was finally done with the rice and started unloading pickles. They had collected an audience now, a dozen of the Wen grouped together in the cave mouth. This was entirely undignified, but Lan Wangji could not think of any other way it could be done. Privacy wouldn’t be appropriate either, even if it was easily obtained. “Lan Zhan, what is this?” “Rice,” said Lan Wangji. Someone laughed. Wei Ying rubbed his forehead; many hours of Wangji’s aggravation in their youth were avenged. “I can see that.” Wangji finished lining up the pickled vegetables, and handed Wei Ying the single sealed jar of ginger. Wei Ying frowned at it, a little wrinkle between his eyebrows. He was adorable. He sighed, and bent to put the pickled ginger next to the pickled cabbage. “Lan Zhan,” he said. “Really. What is this?”

Lan Wangji reached into his final pouch and pulled out the bolt of deep blue silk. He could not press it into Wei Ying’s hands; they were covered in dirt. He set it across the top of one of the stacks of rice baskets. A hush had fallen over the Wen. Wanji stepped closer to Wei Ying, and sought his eyes now that he had been evading. “Gifts,” he said, and felt that the way he said it left no question of his intent.

It was a pathetic offering—nothing compared to what would have been given if he had made a match approved by his sect and clan, what would have been brought forth to honor his bride. But it was what he had been able to bring, without that approval. A dowry he had assigned himself, as it were.

And far more valuable to Wei Ying and the people he had chosen to protect than treasures would have been.

Wei Ying’s mouth and hands worked emptily for a moment, and he made several stifled sounds, as though the silence spell had somehow been cast on him without sealing his lips shut. “You,” he managed. He took a deep breath, closed his eyes, let it hiss out. Turned to their audience and pointed, jauntiness back in his motions, the slant of his eyebrows, the tilt of his head. “Okay, everybody scram.”

The Wen laughed at him, but they did go. Fourth Uncle called congratulations and someone whooped; Wei Ying rolled his eyes and shooed them off.

When he turned back to Wangji he was subdued again. His smile small and unreal. “Lan Zhan,” he said, “you can’t do this.”

“These are nothing.”

The linen and cotton, the other bolt of silk, the shirts, the little clothes for A-Yuan, he should unpack all of those as well. But he could not stop looking back at Wei Ying.

Wei Ying blew out another breath, puffing out his lips as it went this time. “Thank you for the rice,” he said, unhappily. “I—I don’t want to refuse it on behalf of everybody, and I….”

There was a struggle on his face that sent a chill through Lan Wangji. Wei Ying, trying to refuse a marriage, with a pile of a little more life lying at his feet as a bribe he could not ignore.

Could he never escape becoming his father.

“No,” Lan Wangji said sharply. “No, even if Wei Ying sends me away in disgrace, these things will stay here. It is not.” He stopped, gathered his thoughts. “I am not trying to buy you.” As though a year’s worth of rice and some decent silk could begin to add up to the value of Wei Ying.

“The disgrace is staying here!” Wei Ying said, shockingly direct. He seemed startled by it as well, as Wangji studied his face. “Lan Zhan, you don’t deserve this.”

Lan Wangji tilted his head. He could choose to agree, to say he didn’t deserve Wei Ying, never could, but wanted him anyway. He would like to see how Wei Ying responded to that—probably by recoiling, but in the way that made Wangji’s chest ache for Wei Ying rather than for himself. “You do?” He flicked his eyes the way the Wens had gone. “They do?”

“Lan Zhan. You could have anything and anyone. I can’t—tie you to a heap of corpses.” Wei Ying made a face and glanced sourly at the wall of rice again. “The rice was a good move,” he acknowledged. “I keep wanting to say something mean to make you leave, but most of them sound stupid now.”

Wei Ying should not have admitted to that tactic aloud, Lan Wangji thought to himself, but he didn’t point out the error. “Not tied to the corpses,” he said. “Tied to Wei Ying.” Oh, how he wanted to be tied to Wei Ying. Oh, how bound he was already.

Wei Ying laughed, the unpleasant sound Lan Wangji had gotten used to during the war, but without the thick layering of pride that had covered it then. “Do you really think there’s a difference?” He shook his head and spread one hand, palm up, taking in all their surroundings. “This is a place for the doomed, Lan Wangji. You don’t belong here.”

“I came here doomed, and had my life returned to me.” Lan Wangji took a step forward, pinning Wei Ying under his attention. “Wei Ying. Do not refuse me for my sake. I—”

Lan Wangji had tormented himself so selfishly over Wei Ying leaving him behind, all this time. As though following were wholly beyond his power, as though Wei Ying were the only one who could choose to alter his path—because he had been so sure his own was right, that Wei Ying must return to his side on it, or be counted lost.

His love had not been strong enough. He had not been brave enough. He had mourned their parting. A child deprived of a toy. “There will be no one else. There is nothing else for me, now.”

To give up Wei Ying, after having had him—to turn away from that whispered affection, or the consuming addiction of desire now whetted by knowledge—impossible. He wanted to say, if I was willing to make love to you within sight of your horrible blood pool in full possession of my faculties, why do you think there is anything that would turn me away now, but he did not think it would resonate with Wei Ying the way he wanted, since it admitted to the repulsiveness of the blood pool. Wei Ying had to be aware of the repulsiveness of the blood pool, but Lan Wangji could attempt to be diplomatic in his own marriage negotiations, unorthodox as they were.

Wei Ying’s face twisted, but it passed through anger into grief. “Lan Zhan,” he said, with tears in his voice though not in his eyes. “Don’t say that. Don’t tell me I’ve ruined you.”

“Not ruined.” Lan Wangji finally drew close, and for a moment it seemed Wei Ying would allow it, but then he spun and danced away sideways, in the only direction allowed by the wall of rice baskets, and was again too far away to kiss.

“I had Jiang Cheng throw me out of the Sect to avoid dragging anyone else down with me. Lan Zhan, you can’t—”

“Stupid.” Lan Wangji frowned. He supposed he should have known that was Wei Ying’s idea. Jiang Wanyin had never impressed Wangji particularly, but among the virtues he did have, courage and loyalty must surely be counted foremost, judging by what Wangji had seen in the war and particularly those three months together, searching for Wei Ying.

Left to his own devices, Sect Leader Jiang would have taken longer to disavow his head disciple, whose unorthodox cultivation he had championed on the battlefield, even if he was too politically cowed by the Jin to defend him properly, either. But Wei Ying, of course, had hastened to make himself a sacrifice.

Wei Ying snorted. “Oh, and you’re planning to bring the whole support of the Lan behind you?”

Of course, he clearly wasn’t. And if any disciple other than himself had staged such a shameless robbery, he would be a wanted criminal. But unless they expelled him, which his brother and uncle would, he felt, after the way he had parted with them, fight with all their considerable power, his affiliation with the sect would still be valuable. To all of them. “Wei Ying does not always have to be the shield. Sometimes, he should be protected also.”

“Lan Zhan.” As easily as that, Wei Ying was looking at him shattered. The vulnerability on his face hurt to witness even as Lan Wangji reveled in it. He was learning Wei Ying, how to love him for his sake, rather than for Lan Wangji’s own.

“Do you not want me?” he asked, bracing himself for an affirmative. Wei Ying might say it and lie; Wei Ying might say it and, despite everything before, actually mean it. He had had time to think, while Lan Wangji was gone.

“I don’t want your pity.” The word curdled on Wei Ying’s tongue and in the air, and his face wore an ugly look again. “We will live as we may. We have survived this long without you, Hanguang-jun, and we will live after you grow sick of the foul air and poisoned earth and leave again. This place is beyond the reach of the cultivation world, why bring it here with you?”

“Even though you do not need me,” Lan Wangji said carefully, letting the sharp edge of those words break over him like a wave because Wei Ying had admitted outright he said these things to drive people away; because declaring everyone here doomed even the little child, and then saying they would live despite him, was too much contradiction to bother with. “Do you want me?”

“If I say no will you go?”

The refusal to say it at once was an answer in itself. “If I believe you.”

Wei Ying snorted, less disgust than acknowledging Lan Wangji’s point scored. He smiled unhappily. “Lan Zhan, I’ve made my choices. I would make them again, even knowing where they’ve led me. That doesn’t mean I want to bring you down with me. You don’t owe me anything. You do realize you don’t owe me?”

Lan Wangji hesitated. It was a difficult question. He did not, precisely, feel indebted to Wei Wuxian, not the way Wei Ying meant or the way his brother had, though he was acutely aware of the gift of his life and the cost Wei Ying had borne to give it. But he did feel obligation toward him, a duty, which was a kind of owing as well. “Wei Ying deserves better,” he said. “And I owe you—courtesy, at least.”

“Courtesy,” Wei Ying echoed, abstract, scornful. His eyes flicked down, past Lan Wangji’s eyes to his mouth.

“You never answered my question,” Lan Wangji said.

“Which one? Oh. Lan Zhan. Who would ever not want you?” Wei Ying shook his head, but there was a smile there now, one that caught in the corners as though pain and fondness were the selfsame emotion.

Once again, he spoke of it like he spoke of natural law.

Lan Wangji ached. “Wei Ying.”

Wei Ying sighed, and glanced at the wall of rice, the silk. Lan Wangji’s perhaps pathetic offering of something, anything more valuable than merely himself. A little life. “I really don’t understand,” he said. “When you left, I thought—”

“You didn’t expect me to return.”

“No. I thought you’d listened.” Wei Ying shook his head. “I don’t want to—I know what they say about me, but I never wanted to…” He took a breath, and tried again. “You’re so brilliant, Hanguang-jun, so good, they named you well, and I would never want to be the reason that light was stolen from the world.”

“Already done.”

Wei Ying winced, and looked at him with his eyebrows knit, annoyed.

Lan Wangji said, “You took the light from my world when you went into the dark.”

[robininthelabyrinth]

Minific: aggressively ace jc hit by aphrodisiac, becomes super cuddly and cute??

"We're not talking about this," Jiang Cheng said. His tone was harsh and stern as always, except that it wasn't as effective as normal.

Probably because of the way he was aggressively cuddling them.

"Sure, jiujiu," Jin Ling said.

"Shut up, brat."

"I was agreeing with you!"

"I will break your legs."

"Will you break mine, too?" Wei Wuxian asked, vastly amused. He didn't mind this little cuddle pile in the slightest, though he was a little worried about what was going to happen when one of them eventually needed to answer the call of nature - thus far, Jiang Cheng had used Zidian to drag anyone who tried to slip out of the pile right back in, right away. He didn't seem inclined to stop, either.

"Yes," Jiang Cheng said flatly. "I will."

"...can I leave?" Lan Wangji asked, staring up at the ceiling as if he wanted to be struck by lightning in a more direct fashion.

"I wish you would," Jiang Cheng grumbled, but the second Lan Wangji tried to lean away he was promptly reeled back in. "I meant metaphorically. You're Wei Wuxian's husband, you're included by proxy to him - have some respect for your in-laws!"

Wei Wuxian sniggered. "Sorry, Lan Zhan. Looks like you're going to have to keep me company for a while yet...do we know how long this is going to last, by the way?"

"I think it's only supposed to be a few shichen," Jin Ling said. "But that's when it's...uh...acting normally."

"When it's a fucking curse, you mean?"

"...yes. That."

"Well, I'm certainly not fucking anyone," Jiang Cheng said, as if that wasn't obvious to anyone with eyes in their head - he'd out-willed a curse on just that subject, after all. "I don't see why it'd last longer just because of that, though."

"Maybe if it's tied to exertion? The point of a fucking curse is that you're supposed to tire yourself out, after all - maybe we'll be stuck her until you expend as much energy cuddling as you would have if we'd been fucking instead..."

"That's a terrible idea," Jin Ling said. "I don't even know what high-energy cuddling would look like."

"Maybe we should ask someone," Lan Wangji said, voice still very flat. "Sect Leader Nie, for instance. I believe he's around."

"...is he," Jiang Cheng said in a very familiar tone of voice, and Wei Wuxian resigned himself to having a Nie-shaped addition to the pile. Probably an involuntary addition.

It was all right, though. Nie Huaisang could probably use the hug.